Save the Date! Our Annual Markham Native Plant Sale: May 9, 2015

Our large Annual Native Plant Sale will be taking place on Saturday, May 9, 2015, 10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. at the Markham Civic Centre. Parking is free. It is Canada's largest one-day native plant sale. Please take at a look at our Annual Native Plant Sale Flyer. We hope to see you there!

The North American Native Plant Society will be very busy in the coming months. We will be hosting several speakers, workshops and plant sales and we will be appearing at a number of events and Seedy Saturdays. For a complete list of our upcoming events, please check out our Spring, 2015 Event Flyer. We hope to see each and every one of you in the coming months!

The 2014-15 NANPS Seed Exchange

The 2014-15 North American Native Plant Society Seed Exchange is available on our web-site. The seed list is updated as they arrive. Please click here for the most recently updated list (updated Feb. 1, 2015).

The 2014 North American Plant Society Annual Report

Please click on the link below to read the North American Native Plant Society's Annual Report covering the period October 20, 2013 to November 15, 2014

Lorraine Johnson to Speak on Growing Edible Native Plants

The North American Native Plant Society is proud to present noted author and native plant expert Lorraine Johnson at the North York Central Library Auditorium (5120 Yonge St., Toronto) on Monday, March30th at 7:30. Lorraine will be speaking on the topic “Flowers and Food: Growing Edible Native Plants”. This talk is the first of two presentations that will be video recorded, edited and made available online thanks to generous funding from The McLean Foundation.Photo by Andrew Leyerle

Lorraine is the author of more than 10 books, including The New Ontario Naturalized Garden; 100 Easy-to-Grow Native Plants for Canadian Cities; and The Gardener’s Manifesto. Her most recent books are City Farmer: Adventures in Urban Food Growingand editor for the Canadian Gardener’s Guide and has travelled extensively throughout the U.S. and Canada to research native plant landscapes and design. She continues to work as a consultant on various landscape projects and has also been involved in urban agriculture since the early 1990s. Most recently, she was the lead writer of the document “GrowTO: An Urban Agriculture Action Plan for Toronto,” the recommendations of which were accepted for further study by Toronto City Council in November 2012.

Over the years, Lorraine has been involved with many organizations, including the North American Native Plant Society from 1995 to 2002 (President from 1998 to 2001). Lorraine is currently at work on a book tentatively titled From Barnyard to Backyard: The Urban Livestock Revolution.

In this illustrated talk, Lorraine Johnson will combine two timely and popular subjects—urban agriculture and native plant gardening—and inspire gardeners to grow edible native plants on their own properties.

Barbara Fallis Memorial Speaker Series 2015

Join us on Thursday, March 19th for "Reviving Rare Plants at The Riverwood Conservancy". This event will be held on at the Toronto Botanical Garden (777 Lawrence Avenue East, North York, Ontario) from 1:00 to 2:30 pm.

Presenter: Nina Barabas

The northernmost part of Canada’s Eastern Deciduous forest, the Carolinian Zone, hosts numerous rare native wildflowers. Many are endangered due to loss of habitat, or from years of over-harvesting from the wild. Join Nina Barabas, co-author of Wildflowers of Riverwood, to explore the impacts of including them in our gardens.

Presented by TBG as part of their HortiCULTURE Lecture Series in partnership with the North American Native Plant Society.

Admission: NANPS and TBG Members / Guests $22,General Admission $28

Photo courtesy of The Riverwood Conservancy

Healing Gardens Workshop

On Saturday, April 25, NANPS will be hosting a special all-day workshop in Toronto from 9:00 to 4:00 pm.

Consider creating a sacred garden as part of your own perosnal journey or as a special healing place (such as a memorial, peace or meditation garden).

The Healing Gardens Workshop was developed by the Naturalized Habitat Network. While many landscapes may offer restorative qualities, a healing garden is designed with healing and well-being as its main focus. Each garden will be unique. it may be designed to foster physical, emotional and spiritual well-being, or exist as a meditation, peace or memorial garden. The workshop will draw on an eclectic mix of landscaping disciplines, including Japanese and European Monastic gardening, along with First Nations healing traditions. It will also draw inspiration from nature itself, so as to incorporate elements of our natural heritage and its native plants. Discussion will include the review and selecting of suitable native trees and shrubs, grasses and wildflowers.

Margaret Atwood

We are pleased to welcome Margaret Atwood as a new Honorary Director of the North American Native Plant Society. Margaret Atwood has written more than forty volumes of ficton, non-fiction, poetry, and children's literature. She has been acknowledged with numerous literary awards and honours including the Booker Prize, Governor General's Award and Giller Prize. She has received honorary degrees from 24 academic institutions and is a Companion of the Order of Canada. She is also an unflinching advocate for environmental issues.

Our 2014 Award Winners

The North American Native Plant Society recently held its Annual General Meeting in Markham, Ontario on November 15, 2014 where we announced the winners of this year's awards.

Congratulations to the Red Mountain Campus of Mesa Community College in Mesa, Arizona for being awarded the Founders Conservation Award. You can find out more about Red Mountain Campus' efforts to restore and maintain native plant populations on their grounds by watching this short acceptance video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Pyh-X8h33A&feature=youtu.be

We would also like to congratulate Angelique-Marie Mori, Alan Bell and Paul Foster, each of whom were awarded a Garden Award for their inspiring efforts to create native plant habitat in urban settings.

Rolf Struthers and Vivienne Denton were also recognized with Volunteer of the Year Awards for their contributions to the society. Rolf has done an outstanding job processing our memberships and maintaining our membership base while Vivienne has supported NANPS in several ways, particularly as a long-time supporter of our seed exchange.

Community Canoe Projects

What’s a Community Canoe Garden? NANPS has been working in conjunction with the David Suzuki Foundation’s Homegrown National Park project and helping to convert old canoes into pollinator-friendly native plant gardens. NANPS has provided funding and plenty of volunteers to assist in the creation of the canoe planters. Community Canoe Gardens have been installed in a number of parks, school yards etc. The photographs below are from a planting that took place in July, 2014 in Toronto's Stanley Park.

Photos by Adam Mohamed of NANPS and Jode Roberts of the David Suzuki Foundation

Join us!

Please consider supporting our efforts! Membership in the North American Native Plant Society is only $25 a year ($10 for students!). For your membership fees you will receive four issues of The Blazng Star, our e-newsletter The Local Scoop, members-only access to our seed exchange, and pre-order priveleges at our annual native plant sale. You will also support our other activities that include the preservation of our two conservation properties (Shining Tree Woods and Zinkan Island Cove), the Dr. Barbara Fallis Lecture Series, plant rescues, restoration projects, education materials as well as advocacy and promotion for the inclusion of native plants in green spaces.